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We halted, and I caught my breath, glad of the light even though it scorched my face with fresh heat. “Is that a strongbox?”
Ethan nodded. “I’d say so.”
I frowned. “Did that seem too easy to you?”
“We’re not finished yet.” He inhaled, scenting for trouble, and crept forward.
I hesitated. Lightning flashed, the thunder shaking the walls, and a fine golden glint at thigh level caught my eye.
My heart skipped, and I grabbed Ethan’s arm and yanked him back.
He lurched, and recovered his balance with a little jump. “What?”
I pointed. Smoke particles drifted in the light, around a hair-thin golden wire stretching across the floor. Together, we craned our necks upwards. Above, wicked curved blades glinted, waiting to slice us into salami.
Ethan grimaced. “You’re kidding. Trip wire?”
“Crude but effective. Our demon pals have a sense of humor.”
“Terrific. Watch out for banana peel and itching powder.” He hopped over the wire, sword poised, and I followed.
The strongbox just sat there, black and boring. I eyed it suspiciously. Couldn’t be this easy. Not like a job topside, where you just break in, take stuff, and run away. Surely?
Ethan lifted two fingers, and a soft breeze whistled, blowing away the smoke. Tiny sparks crawled over the box, testing, seeping into the crack between body and lid. He shrugged, and the sparks extinguished. “I get nothing.”
&n
bsp; “What? No alarms? No threats of imminent evisceration?”
“Not a whisper.”
“Maybe what’s inside is the kicker.”
“You think? How are you with locks?”
I whipped a shard of glowing pink fairyglass from my corset—who says you can’t use an ingredient for more than one spell?—and waved it at him. “Watch me and weep.”
I bent closer to the barbed padlock, and now that prehistoric coward inside me was really getting her voice on. Demon box! Eek! Run! she squealed, and, for a moment, I hesitated.
Stealing a cursed amulet from a demon lord. Not one of my safer ideas.
I glanced at Ethan, who crouched, alert, surveying the creeping darkness for threats, blood still trickling from his nose. I still didn’t get what was in this for him. Was this the part where he turned me over to Kane? Pity. I’d liked having him around. And working for a demon sorta … dirtied him. Ethan wasn’t like me, doing anything for a living. He had standards, at least I’d thought so.
But Phoebus’s whisper from the nightclub caressed my memory, tempting me reckless. One favor, Lena Falco. No catch. Whatever you desire.
This was my big prize. Whatever the risks, it was worth it.
I gripped the glass between thumb and finger and shoved it in the padlock.
The sharp wingshard sliced my skin. Blood seeped, and pink fairy glitter puffed, intoxicating, lulling the lock’s tumblers into submission. I rooted around a bit, feeling for the springs. Click, one. The spikes on the lock jabbed into my palm. Click, two. Clickety click, three. And … clunk. Open.
Thunder rolled, threatening. Carefully, I eased the padlock from its socket on the strongbox, and laid it on the floor.
The box just hunkered there, menacing.
I glanced up, and Ethan shrugged. “Now or never.”
I poked the lid experimentally. It didn’t poke back, and I gritted my teeth against disaster and levered it up.
